ABU DHABI: A United Arab Emirates company is nearing the end of Phase III clinical trials of a Chinese COVID-19 vaccine and hopes to manufacture it next year, a representative said.
The trial, which began in mid-July, is a partnership between Sinopharm’s China National Biotec Group (CNBG) and Abu Dhabi-based artificial intelligence and cloud computing company Group 42 (G42).
The vaccine uses an inactivated virus; a well-known technology which has been used against diseases such as influenza and measles. Two doses are given.
It has been administered to more than 31,000 people in the UAE, Egypt, Bahrain and Jordan, G42 Healthcare CEO Ashish Koshy said.
Results analysis and publication will happen in around two months, Koshy said.
He said G42 has distribution and manufacturing agreements with Sinopharm and hopes to provide the UAE and other regional states with the vaccine, especially those that participated in the trial.
The target is to produce between 75 and 100 million doses next year in the UAE, he said.
“Early results are showing it is safe, there is a general rise in antibodies for all the volunteers,” Koshy said. “In terms of being effective it is on the journey, but only time will tell in terms of the whole picture.”
Emirati volunteer Wo’oud Al-Motawaa was vaccinated around two months ago and returned to the facility in the emirate of Abu Dhabi for one of her follow-up checks.
“I work in a hospital so it was something that we want to help with,” she said. “We trust our country.”
G42 has said the UAE population’s diversity was an asset, offering around 200 different nationalities. Koshy said around 125 nationalities had participated so far.
The UAE, whose tally stands at more than 101,000 infections and 435 deaths, has seen the number of daily new coronavirus cases surge over the past two months from 164 on Aug. 3 to a high of 1,231 cases last week.
The UAE has a high per capita rate of COVID-19 tests, having carried out more than 10 million tests in a population of around 9.9 million, the government statistics authority says.
UAE company nears end of Chinese Covid-19 vaccine trial
https://arab.news/pdxev
UAE company nears end of Chinese Covid-19 vaccine trial
- The vaccine has been administered to more than 31,000 people in the UAE, Egypt, Bahrain and Jordan
Syria Kurds chief says ‘all efforts’ being made to salvage deal with Damascus
- Abdi said the Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF), the Kurds’ de facto army, remained committed to the deal
- The two sides were working toward “mutual understanding” on military integration and counter-terrorism
DAMASCUS: Syrian Kurdish leader Mazloum Abdi said Thursday that “all efforts” were being made to prevent the collapse of talks on an agreement with Damascus to integrate his forces into the central government.
The remarks came days after Aleppo saw deadly clashes between the two sides before their respective leaders ordered a ceasefire.
In March, Abdi signed a deal with Syrian President Ahmed Al-Sharaa to merge the Kurds’ semi-autonomous administration into the government by year’s end, but differences have held up its implementation.
Abdi said the Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF), the Kurds’ de facto army, remained committed to the deal, adding in a statement that the two sides were working toward “mutual understanding” on military integration and counter-terrorism, and pledging further meetings with Damascus.
Downplaying the year-end deadline, he said the deal “did not specify a time limit for its ending or for the return to military solutions.”
He added that “all efforts are being made to prevent the collapse of this process” and that he considered failure unlikely.
Abdi also repeated the SDF’s demand for decentralization, which has been rejected by Syria’s Islamist authorities, who took power after ousting longtime ruler Bashar Assad last year.
Turkiye, an important ally of Syria’s new leaders, sees the presence of Kurdish forces on its border as a security threat.
In Damascus this week, Turkish Foreign Minister Hakan Fidan stressed the importance of the Kurds’ integration, having warned the week before that patience with the SDF “is running out.”
The SDF control large swathes of the country’s oil-rich north and northeast, and with the support of a US-led international coalition, were integral to the territorial defeat of the Daesh group in Syria in 2019.
Syria last month joined the anti-IS coalition and has announced operations against the jihadist group in recent days.
